The real deal

Half marathoners
Today is the day you jump on that long road that takes you to Indianapolis and your first half marathon. Fifteen weeks of training, and some of it looks pretty hard. Your first reaction might be: can I really do this?
The answer, of course, is yes.
The key, in my opinion, is motivation. If you really want to be able to lay claim to a true physical feat, something relatively few people will ever do, you will have that motivation. It'll get you out that door every day, day after day and week after week.
If you are truly motivated, the training will never feel like a job, or like something you dread but you have to do anyway. You'll come to view every workout as an opportunity to get stronger, faster, more confident and closer to your goal. On those occasions when you can't fit your workout in, you'll feel cheated.
What motivates you? Everyone is unique. It's a mind game, really. The motivation for my first half marathon and first marathon were the same: fear. Sure, I wanted to be able to say I'd run a half or a full, definitely. But those weeks of training were motivated primarily by a fear of not finishing. I was simply not going to NOT finish. Did I think I might not finish? Absolutely. But I was going to do everything in my power to keep that from happening.
Along the way, though, I found a particularly good workout motivated me for the next one. Sometimes even a bad workout motivated me, because I knew I could do better and couldn't wait to prove it to myself.
A look through your training schedule might instill a little fear at this point. But just take it a week at a time. Try not to be concerned about what's coming two or three or 10 weeks down the road. Whatever it is, if you've done the work leading up to it, you'll be able to do it. Trust the training.
This week you've got a recovery run, a semi-long run, another recovery and then a long run. Do not ever be concerned with time on your recovery runs. Definitely never run them fast. Think of a recovery run as almost a day off from running. Any run with the word "long" in it has one purpose: to build endurance. Speed is not the issue, and you do not need to run any fast miles at this point.
Again, take it a week at a time. I promise that by the time you are within two or three weeks of the race you will wonder where all the time went, and you will be chomping at the bit to run your first half.